The "geek talk" comes from the Droidtard army who bemoan the iPhone's closed system and lack of ability to be used as a mobile wifi hotspot among other things.

So you've got the freedom to open up your Droid and link it to six or seven devices, what is the "real world" performance like for the "consumers" using those six or seven devices?

What looks good on paper sounds as if it would be next to useless in the "real world".

This is why I dismiss the "Droid does" rubbish as marketing gobbledygook, a load of buzzword laden hogwash regarding a subpar phone on a subpar network, it doesn't even multitask, a call comes in and all your wifi hotspot sharers drop their connection.

This facet of the "Droid does" mantra sounds as useless as tits on a bull.

Quote:

Originally Posted by samab

From the consumer's point of view, it didn't really matter.

Verizon with their slower 3G network, without the iphone --- managed to bring in more contract subscribers (in a iphone launch quarter no less) than AT&T's faster 3G network with iphone exclusivity.

That's the real world --- not your geek talk.

Better than my Bose, better than my Skullcandy's, listening to Mozart through my LeBron James limited edition PowerBeats by Dre is almost as good as my Sennheisers.

It's dual carrier for 42 mbps --- which means you need 20 MHz (10 up and 10 down) of spectrum space. It has nothing to do with US being ahead/behind --- it has to be with the fact that Australia doesn't have much of a population.

No, the issue with Verizon is the ancient standard of CDMA, not spectrum. AT&T and T-Mobile have access to HSPA technology. Yet they don't seem to be able to implement it well. (Note, Telstra's 42mbit capability is just for PR, they don't yet have any modems out capable of it yet, their network as far as the consumer is concerned is 21mbit if you buy a 21mbit USB dongle). What I'm saying is AT&T doesn't need 20mhz of spectrum to do a better job. Their current spectrum is enough to enable 21mbit. And infact T-Mobile is currently upgrading their network to 21mbit HSPA, and it's already beating Sprint 4G in tests. Unfortunately they lack quality spectrum.

And what's a simple population count got to do with it? It should be looked at more in terms of cell towers required on a per capita basis. Telstra has a situation worse than Verizon in terms of population. Australia is a country of similar size to the USA, with only 22 million people. Population density is lower, hence the cost to provide rural coverage is higher, because there's fewer customers to generate revenue over the area you're trying to cover. Also note that Telstra's network is entirely 850mhz 3G, and their land coverage area is over an area 3 times the size of the state of texas. And they only have 22 million potential customers to generate the revenue to pay for this. Additionally cities like Sydney and Melbourne are big urban metropolis, that compare to San Francisco in size (San Francisco CBD is about half the size of Sydney's infact), and Brisbane would compare to Boston in size (by which I mean, size and density of these cities central business districts, not population). So Telstra also has dense large cities and highly congested downtown towers to manage, just like what US carriers have to deal with. Yet they still do a better job than any US carrier and are highly profitable, generating 4 billion in profits in 2009 on 24 billion revenue.

Optus is our weaker carrier, they have call drop out and congestion issues like AT&T in our large cities.
Don't believe me? Look at this link. Should sound like Deja vu to an American, Optus is quite comparable to AT&T.http://delimiter.com.au/2010/07/15/o...ur-3g-network/

It's nothing to do with population size or CDMA vs HSPA. It's simply some carriers have the competency to build a network, and others don't. Verizon is competent but stuck on a standard that's slower.
Come back in a few years when both Telstra and Verizon have their LTE networks operating. That'll be fun to compare.

Quote:

Infrastructure for AT&T may be insufficient --- doesn't mean that the entire US is insufficient. Where are the high-end users when Telstra only up the allowance to 1 GB per month. Your high-end user is our low-end user.

What???? The majority of AT&T iPhone users are under 200MB, AT&T provided the statistics. Caps on Australian carriers are around the same as AT&T's caps in quantity and price.

No, the issue with Verizon is the ancient standard of CDMA, not spectrum. AT&T and T-Mobile have access to HSPA technology. Yet they don't seem to be able to implement it well. (Note, Telstra's 42mbit capability is just for PR, they don't yet have any modems out capable of it yet, their network as far as the consumer is concerned is 21mbit if you buy a 21mbit USB dongle). What I'm saying is AT&T doesn't need 20mhz of spectrum to do a better job. Their current spectrum is enough to enable 21mbit. And infact T-Mobile is currently upgrading their network to 21mbit HSPA, and it's already beating Sprint 4G in tests. Unfortunately they lack quality spectrum.

And what's a simple population count got to do with it? It should be looked at more in terms of cell towers required on a per capita basis. Telstra has a situation worse than Verizon in terms of population. Australia is a country of similar size to the USA, with only 22 million people. Population density is lower, hence the cost to provide rural coverage is higher, because there's fewer customers to generate revenue over the area you're trying to cover. Also note that Telstra's network is entirely 850mhz 3G, and their land coverage area is over an area 3 times the size of the state of texas. And they only have 22 million potential customers to generate the revenue to pay for this. Additionally cities like Sydney and Melbourne are big urban metropolis, that compare to San Francisco in size (San Francisco CBD is about half the size of Sydney's infact), and Brisbane would compare to Boston in size (by which I mean, size and density of these cities central business districts, not population). So Telstra also has dense large cities and highly congested downtown towers to manage, just like what US carriers have to deal with. Yet they still do a better job than any US carrier and are highly profitable, generating 4 billion in profits in 2009 on 24 billion revenue.

Optus is our weaker carrier, they have call drop out and congestion issues like AT&T in our large cities.
Don't believe me? Look at this link. Should sound like Deja vu to an American, Optus is quite comparable to AT&T.http://delimiter.com.au/2010/07/15/o...ur-3g-network/

It's nothing to do with population size or CDMA vs HSPA. It's simply some carriers have the competency to build a network, and others don't. Verizon is competent but stuck on a standard that's slower.
Come back in a few years when both Telstra and Verizon have their LTE networks operating. That'll be fun to compare.

What???? The majority of AT&T iPhone users are under 200MB, AT&T provided the statistics. Caps on Australian carriers are around the same as AT&T's caps in quantity and price.

Don't need 21 mbps HSPA network if there are no handsets available.

After the end of the USSR, my country, Canada, is the largest country on earth by geographical area. Population density is very very very low for the whole country. BUT 75% of the population lives within a couple of hours from the US border. And the biggest 5 cities in Canada totalled 45% of Canada's population.

Australia is similar to Canada. It looks good to show the "whole country" population density, but you are talking to a Canadian with similar population density.

Finland, Sweden, Norway --- they all rank super high in fiber optics penetration. Why? Not because they are advanced, but because covering just the biggest city will cover 25-33% of the whole country's population.

Australia is a country of similar size to the USA, with only 22 million people. Population density is lower, hence the cost to provide rural coverage is higher

Excellent post, @Morn. More considered than my late-night response to @Samab's uninformed pyrotechnics.

The issue of population density needs refinement. The issue for Australia is not population density for the entire continent (although you are of course right to point out that servicing rural/remote regions of Australia is expensive) but more the fact that roughly 90% of the Australian population lives in cities.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, 90% of the Australian population lives in metropolitan/urban regions. This may feel counter-intuitive to those whose impressions of Australia have been defined my images of the outback, deserts and wilderness, but in terms of population distribution, Australia has one of the most urbanised populations in the world — twice as urbanised as Canada, for instance.

So, the fundamental quantitative fact is that the penetration of 3G services to the majority of the Australian population is far greater in comparison with most, if not all, other developed nations, due to the fact that the percentge of urbanisation (not population density across the continent) is far higher. Of course there will be local variations... Manhattan has a much higher poulation desnsity [25,000 per sq km] than, for instance, Sydney [2,800 per sq km, similar to San Francisco or Seattle] but overall Australia is even more urbanised than the USA (90% vs 80% respectively)

Additionally, given that Australia is so highly urbanised, far more of the total population receives far better 3G penetration. The technological superiority (in comparison to, say, AT & T) of the Telstra network (not accurately described by Wire) means that the experience of the 3G network by most Australians is significantly better than that experienced by North Americans.

The Australian media continues to report that on the whole Australian users of the new iPhone 4 are NOT EXPERIENCING THE DEATH GRIP! If they are are, it tends to be in the relatively few areas of poor reception.... one might therefore infer that the Death Grip as it it experienced in North America is more an issue with network quality, and NOT a significant hardware fault with the phone.

[PS — I am not a Telstra person, by the way. I am just a punter and I actually use a different carrier. But I am aware of how good the Telstra network is by international standards]

Until you get to Sydney Harbour on New Years Eve, then it all breaks down especially just after midnight.

Quote:

Originally Posted by muqmuq

Additionally, given that Australia is so highly urbanised, far more of the total population receives far better 3G penetration. The technological superiority (in comparison to, say, AT & T) of the Telstra network (not accurately described by Wire) means that the experience of the 3G network by most Australians is significantly better than that experienced by North Americans.

The Australian media continues to report that on the whole Australian users of the new iPhone 4 are NOT EXPERIENCING THE DEATH GRIP! If they are are, it tends to be in the relatively few areas of poor reception.... one might therefore infer that the Death Grip as it it experienced in North America is more an issue with network quality, and NOT a significant hardware fault with the phone.

[PS I am not a Telstra person, by the way. I am just a punter and I actually use a different carrier. But I am aware of how good the Telstra network is by international standards]

Better than my Bose, better than my Skullcandy's, listening to Mozart through my LeBron James limited edition PowerBeats by Dre is almost as good as my Sennheisers.

There are USB modems for mobile broadband at 21mbit available. Not handsets, but you can use the 21mbit speeds on your laptop. In real world it's around 5mbit to 12mbit. Depending on tower congestion etc.

Quote:

After the end of the USSR, my country, Canada, is the largest country on earth by geographical area. Population density is very very very low for the whole country. BUT 75% of the population lives within a couple of hours from the US border. And the biggest 5 cities in Canada totalled 45% of Canada's population.

Australia is similar to Canada. It looks good to show the "whole country" population density, but you are talking to a Canadian with similar population density.

Finland, Sweden, Norway --- they all rank super high in fiber optics penetration. Why? Not because they are advanced, but because covering just the biggest city will cover 25-33% of the whole country's population.

Yes I realise this. And Sydney's downtown would be the 3rd largest in America if it was an American city, it's some where between the size of San Francisco and Chicago. Being the business and banking centre of Australia and New Zealand. Mass amount of low density rural areas and some large dense cities are 2 big challenges Telstra has to deal with. They actually cover a huge area of the outback in 21mbit 3G, in spite of the low amount of people living there. Because they can sell it as broadband to that 10% of the population that are rural folk, it's cheaper to build out than DSL or cable.

Quote:

Additionally, given that Australia is so highly urbanised, far more of the total population receives far better 3G penetration. The technological superiority (in comparison to, say, AT & T) of the Telstra network (not accurately described by Wire) means that the experience of the 3G network by most Australians is significantly better than that experienced by North Americans.

The Australian media continues to report that on the whole Australian users of the new iPhone 4 are NOT EXPERIENCING THE DEATH GRIP! If they are are, it tends to be in the relatively few areas of poor reception.... one might therefore infer that the Death Grip as it it experienced in North America is more an issue with network quality, and NOT a significant hardware fault with the phone.

Uhh. I'd want to talk to several iPhone 4 users on Optus and Vodafone before claiming that.
I've seen the death grip happen on Telstra, but as Telstra is like 5 bars 90% of the time, it took me several days to find a spot with weak enough signal to observe the death grip.